Victory for Religious Freedom

05/17/16

Yesterday, the Supreme Court issued its long-awaited ruling on the HHS Mandate cases that involved the Little Sisters of the Poor, several Catholic dioceses, and a number of other Christian organizations. It is a bit of a disappointment that the Court didn't rule explicitly on the merits of the religious liberty issues, and the case will linger on for a while in the lower courts. Still, given the divisions in the Court after the death of Justice Scalia, I have to consider this to be a major victory The Court unanimously decided to send the cases back to the Circuit Courts, which had previously issued split decisions on the cases. The Supreme Court instructed the lower courts to work out a resolution that would ensure that the religious non-profits would not have to doanything to facilitate the provision of morally offensive services beyond contracting with their insurance company for a policy that excludes them. That will then permit the government to come up with a way to ensure that the services are still offered to the employees of the non-profits. Most important, the Court also ruled that the religious non-profits could not be fined or penalized by the government for taking their stand in defense of their religious liberties. There are a couple of crucial take-aways from this.

All along, the argument by the religious non-profits has been that they don't want to be involved in providing abortion and contraception services that they find morally offensive.

This ruling vindicates that argument, and sends a clear signal to the government that they can't force religious people to violate their religious beliefs by threatening them with ruinous fines.

The ruling also makes clear that it is not the business of the government or courts to tell people when their religious beliefs are burdened by a law. The Court's decision is a direct rebuke to the lower courts who substituted their judgement about Catholic and Christian belief for the plaintiffs.

The government has not been told in no uncertain terms that they have to be more accommodating of religious belief, and more creative in coming up with ways to achieve their goals without burdening religious beliefs.

The government's parsimonious view of religious freedom has now been dealt its fourth consecutive major blow — starting with the Hosanna Tabor case, through Hobby Lobby, and now with Zubik, the Court is sending a clear message that the constitutional recognition of religous freedom has to be given special weight when it is negatively impacted by government policies.

Major kudos have to go out the defenders of religious freedom at the Becket Fund and Alliance Defending Freedom, who gave these cases the benefit of their great legal skills. But more than anything, credit must be given to the Little Sisters of the Poor, Bishop Zubik, Archbishop Wuerl, Priests for Life, and the Christian Colleges who were the plaintiffs in these cases, and who carried the banner for our natural right to practice our faith free of government coercionJames Madison, George Washington, and Thomas Jefferson would be proud.